updated 03:05 pm EDT, Thu June 16, 2011

New Macs may wait until Lion ships

Apple may be eager enough to get Mac OS X Lion on new hardware that it's delaying new Macs until Lion's July release, tipsters maintained Thursday. The new MacBook Air is reportedly already set to go and is being held back only to flash them with Lion once the software is done. AppleInsider in getting the info also believed an upgraded Mac mini and a Thunderbolt-oriented LED Cinema Display were both waiting for the same treatment.

The only delays are likely to be triggered by Lion itself being pushed back.

Apple is likely to have both technical and philosophical reasons for the wait. Holding off until Lion would let Apple save users the trouble of having to download a multi-gigabyte OS or create redemption codes to give out the OS for free. The company also believes iCloud is the core of its future digital media strategy and would want to make sure new Macs were already using it as soon as possible.

The same desire to match the hardware to its ideal platform may be key behind Apple's rumored decision to push new iPhones to September, when it could deliver them with iOS 5 already onboard.

I believe that...

I think Apple know there are going to be some issues for people to adapt how to install a new OS from the app store. If you buy a Mac now you can download Lion for free when ever it is available, but apple wants to avoid customer calls and they prefer to hold and sell the computer with Lion already installed... I think.